Hear Me Screaming
by Eternal Love's Eclipse
Summary: A girl wakes from the change alone and unaware of vampires or possible gifts. Forced to find her own way through this new life, her 'gift' is as much as a curse and leeches away at her sanity leaving only Edward to save her. All Canon. All Vamps. Ed x B
1. The Fires of Hell and the Scent of God

_**Disclaimer: Roses are red,**_

_**Violets are blue**_

_**I'll never own Twilight **_

_**And neither will you. (Unless you are SM)**_

_/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////_

**The Fires of Hell and the Scent of God**

I burned. For a seemingly endless time I was tortured by never-fading pain that far surpassed any I had previously experienced; which I suppose isn't saying much considering my most serious injury during my short sixteen and a half years was a broken toe. I couldn't remember how I had gotten into this state, where I was, or even _who_ I was. The agony obliterated almost all other thoughts, senses, and emotions. However, throughout it all my constant mantra was '_I must not scream, I cannot scream, God don't let me scream.'_ I had no clue as to why it was so important for me to keep my sufferings internal but intuition told me that if I made a single whisper it would be the end of me.

Which, at this point wasn't sounding like such a bad thing but my will to survive was too strong. I held on to my dimming hope that the pain would end and I would be able to continue whatever it was I had been doing before this ordeal.

After what felt like years, I realized I was once again aware of my surroundings, which happened to be the inside of a cement drainage pipe. I saw that the faint daylight at one end and rejoiced inwardly at finding a way to measure the time so I could distract myself, however slightly, from the burning in my veins. Distantly, my brain registered the sounds of vehicles overhead, from which I concluded that I was under a moderately traveled road. I had just made the observation that I shouldn't be able to see so well in the dim light when the fire—impossibly—reached an even higher intensity to which I surrendered once again.

Thanks to my low pain tolerance, I managed to black out shortly after and when I awoke I noticed the fire was changing, becoming more concentrated in my heart and throat and fading elsewhere. My heart was loud and frantic even to my own ears and instinctually I knew it was the end. Whether it was the end of my life or merely the torture I didn't know but I fought to hold onto my restraint as my heart burned with newfound fury. I lost the battle and with one drawn out shriek my heart and the pain stopped. I was momentarily distracted by the sound of my voice for what should have been a glass-shattering shriek sounded more like a professional soprano reaching the high note at the end of a crescendo. After the brief shock of hearing myself hit a note I would never have thought myself capable of, panic set in as I remembered my non-beating heart. I franticly searched for my pulse in my neck but found none. Slowly, I began to realize that I felt no chest pains, shortness of breath, or any of the other things that I thought to characterize a heart attack or cardiac arrest. In fact it didn't seem to be necessary for me to breathe at all. Experimentally, I held my breath but no matter how long I held it I never felt the need to breathe, just a minor discomfort from not being able to smell anything. It was then that I found all my senses had improved exponentially. My eyes, which had always been rather poor before, could now see the tiniest hairline fractures in the pipe around me. I could hear the insects moving in the field that bordered the road, and I had never been able to distinguish so many scents before.

I looked down to my body and saw that it was covered in dirt and blood, which, strangely, caused the smoldering in my throat to erupt into intense flames. Under the filth I saw that my skin was deathly white and perfectly smooth, both strange traits for me as I had a year round tan as a product of being a Californian and a swimmer, and I had waged a constant battle with my skin problems since puberty. I brought my hands up for inspection expecting to see the ragged nails and skin that was scarred from numerous animals, falls, and the sporadic cutting I had inflicted upon myself when my inability to connect with my peers weighed on me too heavily. However, I saw none of the marks or imperfections that had flawed my skin. All was smooth, white flesh.

Dismissing my observations as a result of the poor lighting in the pipe, I carefully stood and, when that motion produced no pain, walked swiftly to the end of the pipe and clambered up on to the road. My movements were so fast and graceful that I couldn't believe it was normal. I had no recollection of it being otherwise, but I had a feeling that most, if not all, of these characteristics were inhuman.

I was about to laugh at myself for such a ridiculous thought but the chuckle died in my throat when I saw that my skin was_ glinting_ in the watery light of dawn. My eyes widened at the sight and I knew then that there were only a few possible explanations. One; I was dreaming, two; the final stage of the virus I had caught and caused me so much agony included fever-induced hallucinations, or three; I wasn't human anymore. Option one sounded the most likely but I never thought myself so imaginative and in dreams weren't your surroundings supposed to be fuzzy and not sharply defined like mine? Hypothesis number two was my next pick but fever and sickness clouded the mind, whereas mine had never been clearer than in this moment. The only explanation left was I was something other than human, but if I wasn't human, what was I?

So involved was I in trying to answer this question that I had forgotten to breathe and when the sound of an early morning commuter in his Saturn reached my ears it didn't register so by the time I tore my gaze from my abnormal skin it was too late for me to avoid it. In the few seconds between my sighting of the speeding car and its impact with my body I had time to flinch into a protective ball and think two last thoughts: '_Why isn't he even trying to slow down or swerve to avoid me?' _and _'How ironic that I survive an immeasurable time enduring pain that could rival the fires of Hell only to be killed minutes later getting run over by a car. Typical.' _Then the inevitable collision occurred but instead of my body being broken, mangled, and thrown by the car, the exact opposite happened. I watched as the car bent around _me_, flip over my still-standing, unyielding person, and land on its roof behind me, shattering all its windows.

I looked down at myself expecting to find extensive damage and gasped when I found no injuries apart from those done to my clothes. With that intake of air I smelled what could only be the essence of God yet invoked the fire of Hades to erupt in my throat and a deep yearning that echoed throughout my entire being. Without conscious thought, I sprinted to the driver's side of the upturned car, yanked out the unfortunate person inside, and plunged my teeth into its neck. I did not feel my victim's feeble attempts to get free that only got weaker, or hear its ever-slowing heart rate. All I was aware of was the taste and feeling of a hot, smooth, sweet, thirst-quenching substance as it flowed into my mouth. It tasted like melted chocolate combined with the tanginess of lemons, the spicy heat of cinnamon, and the freshness of mint.

Too soon the flow of the perfect substance slowed, then stopped and my sanity returned. I found myself holding a young man, his neck bearing marks that looked like two crescents facing each other, and most importantly drained of blood. The man was dead and I had caused it. I now knew what I was. A vampire.

_////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////_

**_AN: First chapter of my first fic, 1,380 words not including this note or disclaimer. Tell me what you thought of it, what you think should happen, or ask any questions you may have. Feel free to correct me on grammar, logic, or deviation from SM's vampire characteristics._**

_**Review even if the only word you write is **_**'hello'**_**! I just want to know you're out there.**_

_**Also, the main character is not Bella or any of the Cullens. We will meet them soon and they will become major players in the story but not yet.**_


	2. Reflections On Life and In Water

_**AN: This will be one of the few times I put an AN here so take this as a **_**WARNING**_**. This chapter is **_**NOT**_** in my normal writing style and is merely to set up later events and the character's rather unique thought process. So please bear with me and don't write me off as talent less because of this chapter. THANK YOU.**_

_**Disclaimer: I've begged the Day,**_

_**Wheedled the Night,**_

_**Bribed the Dawn,**_

_**Yet still don't own 'Twilight'**_

_/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////_

**Reflections On Life and In Water**

I was almost literally flying through the forest; my feet touched the ground so infrequently. The impossible speed should have scared me but I barely noticed. I was in shock from committing an act I had never believed myself capable of; murder. As I ran I thought about all the vampire lore I had learned as a human and wondered how much of it was true. Could I cast a reflection? Could I turn into a bat? I doubted it, that myth always seemed silly to me. Could being staked through the heart really kill me? I didn't think so, seeing as I had survived being hit by a car without even a bruise. But if that myth was incorrect, how many others were wrong? Would I have to sleep in a coffin? Burst into flames when in contact of sunlight, holy water, garlic, or crosses? I know I survived the gray light of dawn, but did that really qualify as true sunlight? And what was with me sparkling in those dim rays? Was it a warning of combustion if I prolonged my exposure? I decided not to risk it in any case. Whether I went up in flames or not, I still didn't want people — humans to see me glitter.

Then came the heavy questions, the ones about my diet. How often did I need to eat? Could I supplement with regular food? Did I have to kill a person when I drank? Or could I improve my control so I that I only took what I needed and stopped before I killed my victim? Somehow, I doubted that it was possible. I didn't even _think_ when I killed the man in the Saturn and if I wasn't even capable of thought when I hunted, how could I remember not to kill?

Unfortunately, vampires also seemed to have perfect recall and the thought of the man I had murdered brought graphic memories of his pale face to my mind. The guilt, the reality of my completely unreal situation came crashing down on me as an almost physical weight that caused my footsteps to slow, falter, and stop. I sunk to my hands and knees at the foot of a Giant Sequoia and sobbed only to find I had no tears. This finding made my hysterics escalate until I was screeching my misery. I cried for the family I had no remembrance of but had logically lost, I cried for the life I had taken on the highway, I cried for the countless other lives that I would inevitably take to sate my thirst, I cried for what I had become, I cried out of frustration at not knowing what it really meant to be a vampire, and most of all, I cried for dreams and life I had had torn away from me and not being able to replace them due to what I was. After all, what was a vampire but a parasite designed to feed off the lives of others? Just like…like any other carnivore in this world.

This new train of thought shook me out of my wails of grief into a stunned silence as I pondered it further. Was it not the natural order of things for one creature to kill another for survival? Did not the lioness kill the zebra for sustenance? The hawk the mouse? One side of me argued that it was cannibalistic considering I had just been human, but the other side countered that I wouldn't be the only species. The dissenting side fought back by bringing to light the fact that humans weren't animals. Surprising myself, my brain whispered, _'But aren't they?'_ Really, what delineated man from beast? What made his life so much more worth preserving? His intelligence? His sense of superiority? The strength of his emotions? His creativity? Or was it man's supposedly endless capability to love that set him apart?

Contemplatively, I thought that it was possible, even likely that there were other animals close to an average human's IQ but that the tests they designed were made for humans. It would be like giving an American student his literary final in Arabic. And what gives humans the right to rule over all things? Because the _Bible_ said so? What can that archaic book decide over logic? Especially in its present, watered-down, altered, barely-recognizable-from-the-original state? As for the poignancy of emotions, how can emotions be truly measured? Emotions by their very nature cannot be adequately expressed in any way and to try can cheapen emotions held most dear, like love. Hmph, love. While in some cases I agree that a human's capability to love is infinite it is easily counterbalanced by their hate, greed, and pettiness. A dog may not love its master with the same strength as said master loves its mate, but neither will the dog be ever truly angry with its master as the master will inevitably feel toward its mate. As far as creativity goes, anyone who has studied biology in any form should know that what some creatures do for mere survival is more creative than anything humans could hope to achieve.

A small corner of my mind recognized my internal monologue as rationalizing, but my sanity depended on quashing the guilt of the murder I had and the murders I would commit, so the voice was quickly pushed away.

Having dealt with my remorse, I got to my feet and decided my first order of business was to evaluate the validity of the myths I had recalled earlier. I quickly chose to test whether or not I cast a reflection, as that was one of the easiest and least dangerous for me to try. Also, I was curious to know how else my appearance had changed besides my skin. I set out to look for some water as I thought that would be the most likely way to see my reflection while remaining in the forest's protective shade.

'_Not that it mattered too much anymore,'_ I thought distantly, as a steel gray sheet of clouds had blown in to cover the sun. The quick weather change combined with the Giant Sequoia led me to believe that I had awoken somewhere in northwestern California.

Concentrating on my desire to find water, preferably a small pond or other stagnant source, I instinctively closed my eyes and simply listened and breathed.

I smelled what I sought before I heard it, but was unable to identify the scent without the accompanying sounds. I detected a scent that reminded me of mud, algae, decay, and yet still seemed refreshing. Moments later I heard the sound of water gently hitting the shore as the wind blew.

Eyes still closed, I ran in that direction, marveling at the power of my senses and body. I had always been a very sight-dependent creature, so to wholly rely on my other senses was a new experience. I was able to dodge all obstacles in my path by feeling the air I moved bounce back and hit me, thus letting me know where and how far away the obstacle was. I could hear all the living things in at least a three-mile radius of where I was, along with their smells. The sound of so many heartbeats made my throat ache again and, chagrined, I opened my eyes to distract myself.

To my pleasant surprise, I could already see the dim shine the water gave off under the lightly but well covered sky. For a brief moment I feared that the water was too dark to reflect images, but before I could worry myself further, I was at the shoreline. My first emotion was pleasure that the conditions were almost perfect for casting a reflection of the lake's surface, proven by the detailed pictures of pines I could see on the water. But as my eye drew down directly before me, I faltered at what I saw. Or rather, at what I didn't see. For where my reflection _should_ have been, there was nothing but the clouds above shown. Panic started to well up in me before I buried it and all other feelings far away.

Clinically, and somewhat sardonically, I thought, _'Myth one has proven to be factual. Vampires do not cast any reflection whatsoever.'_

Just then I heard what would come to be my most loved and hated sound. I smelled what would become my most loved and most hated scent. A heartbeat and the scent of God.

_/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////_

**_AN: 1,425 words not including the AN s or disclaimer for my second chapter of all time._**

**_Please don't correct me on the reflection issue in any reviews you are so kind to give me. I know that is not a vampire characteristic in SM's world but neither is it in mine. I know what I am doing and soon you will too._**

_**Please, please, please forgive me for all the questions in this chapter along with all the odd and probably offensive viewpoints. I must say that I do not necessarily believe the conclusions my character came to, but I have asked myself these questions before. The questions and conclusions she came to were necessary to set her up as a character and to explain her action for sequential chapters. **_

_**If you did not read the AN above I want to reassure you that I will not **_**ever**_** have so many questions in a chapter again. I do not normally write this way, but it was necessary to set up later events.**_


	3. To Sleep, Perchance to DreamOr Not

_**Disclaimer: I have beseeched**_

_**And was quailed**_

_**I have entreated**_

_**To no avail**_

_**I will fight**_

_**Only to fail **_

_**gaining Twilight**_

_/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////_

To Sleep, Perchance to Dream—Or Not

After I was done with my victim—a middle aged woman with dark hair this time—I washed my bloodied hands and face in the water before me. As I washed I stared with sick fascination at the blood as it made swirling patterns in water before being diluted. After I was finished, some instinct told me to hide the woman's body. Which, I decided as I analyzed this urge, made sense if I didn't want to be discovered. After all, I couldn't very well remain inconspicuous if I were to leave a trail of blood-drained bodies behind me.

Knowing what I had to do and knowing how to do it were two completely different things, however. As a result I ended up staring at the body for much longer than I would have liked as I tried to come up with an appropriate way to dispose of it. Staring at the woman for so long caused the soul-crushing guilt I had experienced earlier to bubble up but I suppressed it quickly until I was back to the cold state I had put myself in. Finally, I came to the conclusion that I had two options. One; I put the body in the lake after adding several more lacerations so her family could eventually find it and assume that she had gotten attacked by an animal and the water washed away all of her blood. Or two; I simply bury the body deep into the woods where no one could ever find her. My cold, calculative exterior encouraged me to go with this path as it was easier and decreased the chance of exposure, while my compassionate, _human_ side wanted to give the woman's family some peace. These two sides battled until one emerged victorious.

I scooped up the body into my newly strengthened arms and dashed into the forest.

* * *

After I had finished the task, it dawned on me that in all vampire stories I had read vampires were immortal. I now had the eternity I had so often dreamed about and no clue what to do with it. If I was human I would like to spend it learning everything about anything, but I couldn't walk into a university when I would attack any human that was unfortunate to cross my path. Without that activity, forever was bound to get _fatally_ boring. I smirked at myself for the irony of that statement. At the present, I had no way of knowing even if I could be killed except for possibly pure sunlight.

Getting back to the matter at hand, I tried to plan what I would do with my new life but came up blank. My human memories were of little to no help as they were so few and dim. For example: I knew almost everything academic, like calculus, but had no idea how or when I had acquired such skills. Trying to plan that far into the future was mentally exhausting, so I settled with the present and near future. I figured it was a good idea to test out as many of the myths I could that without endangering myself. I wasn't about to walk into sunlight anytime soon, especially without knowing the consequences. Unfortunately, most of my questions were on what was dangerous to me so I had very few that I could test out safely.

Having significantly narrowed down the myths to test, I quickly chose to see if could sleep as long as I was somewhere dark and enclosed. I was still too human to go digging up coffins for me to use but I thought a small cave or tunnel would suffice.

Not knowing how to find either of these things and having nothing better to do I wandered, testing all of my enhanced senses as I did so. Aside from improved senses and possible indestructibility, I found that my strength was also very great, along with my speed. I utilized these traits to climb a tree to get a closer look at a hawk's nest I had glimpsed between the branches. I managed to jump to the branch nearest the ground (which was still about thirty feet up) and caught it in my hands intending to pull myself up from there. To my dismay, I used a bit too much force in pulling myself up from my hanging position accidentally ripped the branch from the trunk and ended up hurtling back toward the earth. Too shocked to let go of the branch and land in a crouch as instinct told me to do, I crashed into the ground still holding the branch in an undignified tangle of limbs, hair, pine needles, bark, and tree sap.

As I'd more than half expected, I suffered no damage from the fall apart from the additional tears to my clothes. I sighed then attempted to scale the tree again, more to prove to myself that I could do it than to see the nest, and succeeded with no mishaps.

The nest held my attention only briefly as the chicks were still too young to have feathers, and the translucent skin of the baby birds disgusted me. However, the view from such a height was spectacular. The entire expanse of the forest was laid out before me in an almost never-ending, never-broken sea of green. Small lakes and ponds dotted the verdant carpet and lo! I could see the exact thing I needed to perform my next experiment; caves.

Or rather, an abandoned (at least I hoped it was for human's sake) granite quarry. The mine had burrowed deep into the earth at the foot of a small mountain, and looked as though it would be perfect for my needs. I briefly debated whether to get down from my perch and wend my way through the trees to get to my destination or to merely jump from treetop to treetop. I greatly favored the second option as it sounded more fun and I would be able to keep my great view of the night sky and not have to worry about losing sight of my goal.

Decision made, I leapt off my branch onto one on a nearby tree at the same height. I repeated this process for a while, slipping occasionally, until I grew bored of doing the same thing over and over. I realized with the repetition that the less I thought about my actions, the more accurate my motions were and the fewer mistakes I made. Armed with that knowledge, I stopped analyzing move so much and just thought about what I wanted to do then did it. Soon I was doing flips, blind leaps, backward jumps, and even pirouettes between the trees. The tricks I was doing were enough to make an Olympic gymnast cry with envy though they slowed me down some. Of course, I didn't really care about lost time as I was quickly running out of ways to spend it already and I still had a literal forever to go! Still, by the time I reached the quarry the sky was already starting to lighten with the first light of dawn not dimmed by any clouds. I hurriedly sped into the darkness of the tunnels, momentarily worrying about seeing in such blackness until I realized that I had no trouble at all. I knew I had no discomfort yesterday in the light of dawn but that could easily be passed off for me being so new so I didn't want to risk being caught by sunlight of any sort.

Walking farther into the tunnel, I thought about how it really had only been yesterday that I had awoken as a vampire. Only yesterday that I had committed two murders. Only yesterday that I realized that the world I lived in was not as I thought it to be.

As I pondered this, I found what I had unknowingly sought. A ledge in the wall of the tunnel that still housed the various tools needed in the mining profession. I quickly swept off the items and lay down on the alcove. The ceiling was only about a foot away from my nose but I still managed to find the position comfortable. I closed my eyes and let my mind wander in hopes of drifting off to sleep.

At first I thought my problem was that I simply wasn't tired yet and if I just let my mind wander then eventually I would get bored and succumb to slumber. I tried this tactic for a lengthy if indeterminate amount of time as I thought of lighter, more inconsequential subjects such as my appearance. Did I have fangs? I quickly checked by running my tongue over my teeth but my canines felt normal length. I supposed that they might be retractable as in the movie Blade. Was I inhumanly beautiful like some stories said vampires were, or would I be monstrously grotesque? I wondered idly how I was supposed to know what I looked like when I didn't cast a reflection but decided I would just ask someone.

'_That is,'_ I thought morosely, _'if I can keep from killing them.'_ Depressed by this thought, I played a game that seemed fairly familiar to me even if I didn't know why. The game was simple, come up with as many complaints as possible with as little time in between each as you can. I began with obvious, legitimate complaints like,_ 'I'm a murderer but it's not my fault' _and _'I have to murder for the rest of my life unless I commit suicide'_, but quickly descended into petty matters such as _'I have to live for eternity with nothing to do and no one to spend it with unless I kill myself which I won't as I am too much of a coward'_, _' I can't possibly keep my hair looking right without a reflection' _and _'I'm going to get _dirty_ living in the woods'_. Eventually complaints became so ridiculous, I couldn't help but laugh at myself. The game had served more purposes than the original objective to waste time. I was able to vent out my discontent and it pulled me out of my black mood.

With my lightened spirits and troubling matters cleared from my mind, I expected sleep to find me quickly. So I waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Finally, my thirst, which had been growing in intensity for the last few hours, shortened my patience to the extent that I gave up on sleep and went to check if it was dark enough for me to go hunting.

To my surprise, I quickly found my way out of the cavern I had been in with no mishaps. I cautiously approached the edge to determine how much more time I had to waste before the sun went down. To my pleasure and dismay it was twilight. Pleasure because it wouldn't be more that twenty minutes before I could safely leave my lair, and dismay because it would be over fifteen minutes before I could slake my thirst. Petulantly, I sat cross-legged on the floor to wait for the estimated time to end despite the fact I was perfectly comfortable standing. The position reminded me of my obscure memories of meditation. I didn't have any memories of actually doing it, but the supposed results of it were something I could use right now; control of the mind and subsequent serenity.

Without any further delay I proceeded to empty my brain of thought and simply _be_. Not something easily accomplished by an obsessive worrier such as I. As soon as I would cease to think, I ruin it by saying _'hey, I'm doing it!'_ or some such thing to myself and have to start over. I continued this until I got bored and opened my eyes. Through them, I found that it was quite dark enough for me to find my next meal.

And so, I slipped into the night to begin my first hunt.

AN: 2,014 words excluding AN and disclaimer. Sorry about the wait, don't have any excuses except for the fact that I'm at checkpoint A, know where checkpoint B is, but have no idea how to get there.

_**Please review even if you only write a word or two. Just assure me that I have readers!**_

_**Requests: tell me when you think this story should be based. I told one reviewer that it was post-BD but I'm not sure that its really best for this story and the conflicts I have planned. **_

_**Also, as you may or may not have noticed, I have not as of yet mentioned my character's name. This is because she doesn't have one, so please send me some recommendations. I'd like the name to be unique and possibly based on night, shadows, darkness…you get the idea.**_


End file.
